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Greetings!
I am writing to you in the heat of Saigon, the South of Vietnam.
I am thirsty, and I am exhausted.
I am walking along the street filled by the art of storytelling:
Graffiti—youthful, rebellious, resistant, beautiful, and educational.
The thirst for water transforms to the thirst of social equity.
The heat of Saigon transforms to the heat of the energy of the youths.
The exhaustion does not prevent me from walking
to the end of the street.
To explore. To Question.
To Bow before the Beauty of Wisdom.
To Smile. To Feel Proud.
The Beauty of Arts goes along with the Beauty of Equity.
FOR ALL
Regardless of Space; of Time; of Languages; of the Universe.
We, Luis Javier
Pentón Herrera and Ethan Trinh, are the
incoming 2019 co-editors of our Social Responsibility Interest Section
(SRIS)’s newsletter - TESOLers for Social Responsibility. This issue is
special in many ways. First of all, this issue has been entrusted to us
by our experienced and amazing colleagues Anastasia Khawaja and Riah Werner. We have
learned a great deal from Anastasia and Riah’s hard work as outgoing
co-editors of the SRIS newsletter, and both of us are excited and
nervous at the same time as we received this responsibility of
continuing their work in the newsletter as a place where social justice
educators and scholars connect. Second, this issue was done in a
jet-lagging time zone when Ethan was dealing with his mental struggles
in Vietnam while Luis was handling the heavy workload at his high school
at the end of the semester. This issue would not have come to this
stage without the spirit of trust, collaboration, and teamwork that
connect us strongly. Lastly, throughout this issue, we are amazed,
inspired, and impressed by how the scholars, teachers, and educators are
using the arts in their teaching and research all over the
world.
It is, then, with great enthusiasm that we introduce this
issue’s contributions. The issue begins with English language
teaching: Giving voice to social and cultural issues using local
graffiti by Giselle Robitaille. Through her English Language
instruction at Madagascar, Giselle creatively explored the use of
graffiti to go beyond the English classroom discussions and to challenge
her students to think critically about social justice issues in their
communities. Next, Melisa Cahnmann-Taylor leads us to the dialogues of
how using poetry in a study abroad program could help pre-service
teachers reflect deeply about their teaching approach to teach diverse
K-12 students upon returning. The piece titled “Getting more
out of it” Teachers documenting experiences abroad through
poetry is written aesthetically to show the beauty and the
connection of poetry and social justice and creates “a dialogic
classroom” in English language instruction.
The next article, titled Films with plots and themes
related to social issues and written by Mary Romney, is a
useful resource for any educator looking to incorporate films addressing
social issues in their classrooms. Mary reminds us that “film is an
attractive teaching tool for any language skill…that address[es] a
variety of social issues in different countries and cultural contexts”.
Next, the powerful poem SCHOOL, by Ethan Trinh,
shares a strong message to encourage teachers to listen to the silent
voices of students in a classroom and to be creative in writing
instruction. The newsletter ends with Renee Lynch’s book review
titled A way forward: A book review of staging Harriet’s House:
Writing and performing research-informed theatre by Tara Goldstein. This book review is going to provoke some ideas on how to use
the power of theatre in the intersection of teaching, research, and
social justice.
Each contribution is powerful, inspiring, and critical in their
own way. In synergy, all pieces create a collective voice of scholars,
researchers, and teachers who advocate for social justice and for the
students they serve. We hope this issue serves as encouragement for our
readers to explore the use of creative, poetic, aesthetic, and critical
representations as bridges to engage in social justice issues and
dialogues within and beyond the classroom. In addition, we hope this
issue will bring you inspiration, thoughts, and ideas that you can use
for your classrooms in the near future.
Sincerely,
Luis and Ethan | 
